Watchdog Plugin

[rgleason]

BCN, great thanks.
Saw this on sale. Sean could certainly use this as a depth sounder, but he needs more contributions, so that he can add depth features to watchdog.

Lowrance Elite-5 Ti Touchscreen Fishfinder / Chartplotter - Remanufactured
HDI Skimmer Transducer Included, Includes Bluetooth and WiFi Connection
Display: 5 Inch Color, Power: 10-17 Volts DC, Includes Bluetooth and WiFi
Combines CHIRP Sonar, StructureScan and DownScan Imaging
Sale Price: $255.55 Defender 1st Price:$228.65
What is Defender 1st Membership?

[crayiii]

The link to donate doesn't work.

[bcn]

Go here:
About

[crayiii]

Thanks. I just donated.

[rgleason]

Thank you Crayiii. Encourage others to donate so that Sean can do the programming needed.

[AedanC]

I have just donated too. Sorry it took so long, I couldn't get the link to work from a phone so had to wait till I got back to my computer.

[seandepagnier]

I have received a garmin striker 4, but I am still in the boat yard and my focus it to get this boat back in the water for the next 3-4 days. After I will determine if there is nmea output, and if so, I can make depth alarms.

I have received several donations as well! Really thank you all, and if the garmin striker does not have nmea output I will try to find a unit that does.

Also want to integrate with a survey plugin so that you can sail in areas covering it and produce contours of your own chart. It will be interesting, and the chart itself also needs to display the tracks taken and data used, so that you can understand the accuracy of the chart as well. This opens a lot of possibilities, but I only expect to implement depth alarms (under/over depth and rate of change of depth) in the next few weeks. An alarm which can compare the sounder depth to the vector chart depth and if the difference is too large would be interesting.

If the unit can provide more data, it can even show the fish finder display within opencpn, similar to radar plugins, and possibly log this, and replay it along tracks, or even render on the chart actual obstructions or sunken boats etc as they are detected. There are a lot of things possible, but unfortunately this type of thing won't work for all sounders.

[conachair]

Originally Posted by boat_alexandra

Also want to integrate with a survey plugin so that you can sail in areas covering it and produce contours of your own chart. It will be interesting, and the chart itself also needs to display the tracks taken and data used, so that you can understand the accuracy of the chart as well. This opens a lot of possibilities,.

That would be fantastic, especially if it would run on a raspberry pi with a hand held nmea sounder for scoping out anchorages.

[fgd3]

Sean, have you looked at the Garmin Quickdraw Contour Mapping feature? It's available on a lot of their newer chart plotter/depth sounders. The biggest limitation is that it is a proprietary format so the contour maps will only work on other Garmin units. If you could figure out how to convert the Garmin contour map files to something OpenCPN could handle that would be great.


Even better would be to write code that worked the way the Garmin product does. A keel offset adjusts the depths to the water surface (if your transducer is mounted two feet below the water line, the keel offset would be -2'). A recording offset adjusts for the difference between the current water depth and the charted depth. As you cruise around the chart plotter shows a green area where it recorded good depths or a red area where it was not able to detect the bottom. It is easy to see where you have surveyed and where you have missed spots. When the recording is finished the software draws contour lines at 1-foot intervals in the area you surveyed. It's very easy to use and the contour lines give you a detailed picture of the bottom without cluttering the area with sounding numbers.


You can find lots of YouTube videos demonstrating how it operates.


Fabbian

[rgleason]

Garmin Striker 4 looks like it would work.
Garmin STRIKER Plus 4 with Transducer Refurbished
Garmin-4-Pin-PowerData-Cable-P4394.aspx


The cable description shows Nmea 0183 and the Manual shows a "Sharing and Managing Data" section with wiring diagrams but no mention of Nmea0183. Would a Striker 4 Plus be better?


This device includes GPS and does routes and navigation and uploads to Garmin with depth Garmin Quickdraw.
If it works it looks ideal so please contribute to Sean's purchase here: About- DONATE BUTTON
so he can make the needed Watchdog improvements!

[rramsey]

Originally Posted by bcn

Go here:
About

Donated too.

[seandepagnier]

The striker doesn't seem to have nmea output. I'm looking for transducers which can be run from a dst-2.

[Trade Wind]

Watchdog configuration window opens empty window with white background. Both in Ubuntu and Windows OpenCPN Version 5.0.

[conachair]

Originally Posted by Trade Wind

Watchdog configuration window opens empty window with white background. Both in Ubuntu and Windows OpenCPN Version 5.0.

Right click brings up a menu.

[rgleason]

Originally Posted by boat_alexandra

The striker doesn't seem to have nmea output. I'm looking for transducers which can be run from a dst-2.

https://www.actisense.com/product/dst-2/

"The frequency of the DST-2 must match that of the transducer. Typical frequencies used by manufacturers are 150 kHz, 170 kHz & 200 kHz."

Average cost $250

https://g.factoryoutletstore.com/det...gitemid=393716
Product # 010-12401-10 $129

• In - Hull Transducer
• 250 W 8-Pin Transducer
• Operating Frequency 150kHz - 240 kHz
• High Wide Band Chirp
• Hull Deadrise Up to 5°
• Maintains Depth at High Speed

Sean, I hope this will work. You should check though. Works with Striker I think.

Guys, Sean needs more donations if this project is going to get off the ground!

please contribute to Sean's purchase here: About- DONATE BUTTON